You And Me - A Collection of Les Twins One Shots

Meningitis I

Laurent knew better than to hover over his twin like an overprotective mama bear, but my god, did he want to hover.

Today marked the third day in a row that Larry had woken up feeling like shit, and despite his best efforts to hide it, Laurent could tell that he was coming down with something serious.

Larry had already been too pale for Laurent's liking. It was funny how these things were such a dead giveaway, but Laurent knew every possible nuance of his brother's skin, from the sun-kissed tan of a week's vacation to the sickly shade of impending sickness, and when Larry had come into the lobby three days ago, his cheeks had been way too pale to pass as normal in Laurent's book.

The second indication that something was off had been a lot harder to ignore than the first because if there was a surefire way to make Laurent's alarm bells go off, it was to see Larry poking and prodding at his dinner instead of just inhaling it like he usually would. So Laurent took notice of the slow catch and drag to every one of Larry's swallows and while Larry thought he was doing a very good job of hiding his dwindling appetite, Laurent was acutely aware of it.

And then today things finally took a turn for the worse. When they met in the lounge for a quick breakfast this morning, Larry sweated through two entire clean shirts before they even made it out of the restaurant. It was Laurent's cue to finally step in. He could tolerate a little paleness from his twin, he could even turn a blind eye on his brother skipping a meal or two, but the second Larry showed signs of a fever, all bets were off. 

So when they made their way to the lobby, Laurent snatched Larry's wrist and dragged his brother into a dimly lit corner. Before Larry could open his mouth in protest, Laurent's palm was pressed against his forehead. Sure enough, his fingers nearly burnt at the touch. 

"You're an idiot, you know that."

Larry swatted at Laurent's hand. "It's nothing."

"Hiding a fever, Larry?" Laurent snapped at him. "Seriously. From me?"

"'m fine."

Laurent shook his head in annoyance because they both knew that this was going to turn into the flu or strep throat or something equally fucked-up. Larry rarely ever got sick, but if he did he was usually down for the count. 

"I'm not taking you in the condition you're in."

"We can't cancel," Larry sighed while Laurent pulled his phone from his pocket, about to call the manager at the radio channel that had them contracted for an interview. 

What Larry needed was a good night of sleep, some milk with honey, and a couple of pills to get the fever down. And they were going to do all of that, every little thing on Laurent's checklist until he felt better again.

But Eleni chose that moment to step in. "Larry's right. It's in two hours, everyone's ready."

"Larry's also sick," Laurent spat. "And he's clearly delusional if he thinks I'll allow him to work in the state he's in."

"Then go and do the interview by yourself. They won't care if it's just one of us," Larry said and while Eleni seemed visibly relieved by the suggestion, Laurent's concern only grew at the startling lack of protest from his twin.

"No." Laurent shook his head. "I'll stay here with you."

"Lau."

"Eleni, I'm not asking you." Her eyes widened at that but she snapped her mouth shut. Laurent loved her dearly, but at the end of the day, she was still on their payroll. "Tell them we had a family emergency. We'll compensate them if necessary."